and the enemy were scarcely aware of their
presence. But when our company came galloping up the road, in full view,
their attention was aroused, and we had scarcely checked our animals and
exchanged a few words with the foot-soldiers, when a column of smoke
shot up from the wall in front.--"Now look out!" exclaimed some one.
I looked, but saw nothing to follow, and had turned my attention
elsewhere, when I heard a hissing noise, as of something rushing swiftly
past, and at the same time turf is thrown into the air, the horses start
aside in affright, and outcries of pain and terror assail the ear.
After a confused moment, I saw that the shot had struck in the line of
infantry a few feet on our right. One man, the drummer of the party, was
running about in the fluttered crowd with his hand hanging by a shred,
crying, "Cut it off! cut it off! D--your souls, why don't some of you
cut it off?" Another lay struggling on the ground, with the fleshy part
of his thighs torn abruptly off, calling upon some one for God's sake to
take him away from there. But the dismallest sight was a bloody shape,
with face to the ground, fingers clutching the grass with aimless
eagerness, and shivering silently with an invisible wound. Twisting
convulsively, it rolled down into the road under our horses' feet,--and
there this human form, which some call godlike, writhed and floundered
like a severed worm, and disguised itself in blood and dust.

But it is dangerous to look long upon the wounded; an old soldier never
rests his eye there; it is the greatest mistake of the raw one; and it
was well enough for some of us that our attention was timely drawn away
by alarm of another shot from the town. We spurred our horses up the
bank on the left; the foot-soldiers rushed behind the _adobe;_ and this
time the shot passed harmlessly down the road. Before another, General
Henningsen had ordered us all to move forward and get to cover. The foot
stopped in the right branch of a by-lane which crossed the road a little
way ahead. The rangers moved into the same lane,--but on the left, and
divided by the highway from the foot. Here we were entirely hidden from
the town by a belt of small trees and bushes. Nevertheless, the
enemy's round shot, tearing through the trees, still pursued, and the
Minie-balls, though thrown from smooth-bored guns, sang above and far
beyond us. At this place, as near as I recollect, above a dozen men were
killed and wounded,--most